


don't act up, don't act out. be strong.

by tobeconvincedoflove



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Adam doesn't go to Aglionby, Angst, Child Abuse, Gen, Getting Together, Hospitals, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slow Burn, adam has a little sister her name is emma, but that's not the focus of the story, it's not explicitly a no magic au, like it's only explicitly described at one point because it's a remix of That One Night in canon, mildly, oh boy this is the adam has a sister au i was never gonna post, okay so as you can imagine because of robert parrish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-06-19 12:22:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15509781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobeconvincedoflove/pseuds/tobeconvincedoflove
Summary: “Hey, Adam, what’s twenty-four divided by six again?” Emma is sitting on the bed of their father’s new impossible job for Adam: an old, rusty pickup truck. Emma’s legs are crossed, math homework on her lap, hair is free from the ponytail she had wrangled it into that morning all by herself.“What times six is twenty-four?” Adam asks in return. Emma likes doing her homework in the garage while Adam does whatever new chores Robert Parrish cooks up. It’s the only place Adam can help her with it, and Emma might only be eight years old, but she knows better than to ask their parents for help on homework.title from good kid (lightning thief musical)





	don't act up, don't act out. be strong.

**Author's Note:**

> okay friends read the warnings: there's only one very bad™ scene with Robert and Adam (and it's kind of obvious where it's going to happen, so feel free to skip that section), but the rest of it isn't very Good.
> 
> but, this was one that people wanted to read, so I guess, here it is?

“Hey, Adam, what’s twenty-four divided by six again?” Emma is sitting on the bed of their father’s new impossible job for Adam: an old, rusty pickup truck. Emma’s legs are crossed, math homework on her lap, hair is free from the ponytail she had wrangled it into that morning all by herself. Adam doesn’t care if the truck was only two-hundred dollars; it’s got more broken parts than functional ones. 

Not only is Robert Parrish down two-hundred dollars, but Adam is soon to be as well. He knows better than to ask for money to fix it; he’s going to be raiding Boyd’s scraps and buying the parts out of his own salary for the next two weeks. Already, his brain is starting to spiral: Emma needs new sneakers, Adam needs to buy groceries, Emma needs money for a field trip… 

“Adam?” Emma asks again, and Adam shakes his head. Her voice isn’t concerned, not yet. She’s too young to know the full extent of Adam’s constant anxiety. 

“What times six is twenty-four?” Adam asks in return. Emma likes doing her homework in the garage while Adam does whatever new chores Robert Parrish cooks up. It’s the only place Adam can help her with it, and Emma might only be eight years old, but she knows better than to ask their parents for help on homework. 

“Oh. Four. Thanks, Adam,” Emma says, and Adam can hear the gears turning in her head. Right now, Emma hates math, but Adam knows that once math stops being numbers and starts being math, she’s going to like it. “Do you gotta do a lot of homework tonight?”

There are two bedrooms in their double-wide. Emma hasn’t been old enough to warrant kicking Adam out of their bedroom, not yet, but it’s soon coming. When Adam’s doing homework late, it can keep her up, but he would rather have a door to separate himself from his father. (He knows he’d give it up for Emma in a heartbeat, but it doesn’t mean he has to do it before he’s forced to.)

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I’ve got the late shift at the convenience store. You gonna come with?” They both know it’s not really up to Emma whether she comes with or not. 

“Dad’s already home. I shouldn’t go with you,” Emma answers. “Is Ronan gonna be there?” 

“Yeah, probably,” Adam answers, before he finally extracts himself from the car, sighing. 

“The truck is a piece of shit, right?” Emma asks, and Adam allows himself one harsh laugh before he stifles the sound. 

“You’re too young to swear, Emma. And don’t do it around Dad.” Adam sighs deeply. “They’re not hard fixes, but I gotta buy a few parts. I might try to leave early to stop by Boyd’s and scrounge for some of them. I’ll order the rest at my next shift.” 

“Okay. You should have Ronan drive, if he’s gonna be there anyway.” Emma always suggests that Ronan drives, because she likes the metal shit he plays and loves how much Adam hates it. 

“You know Dad doesn’t like him around here,” is all Adam says in response. There’s the part that he can’t tell Emma, no matter how smart for her age she is. He can’t belong to their father, so he can’t belong to Gansey or Ronan, either. “I’m gonna bike. Are you done with your homework?”

“Yup!” Emma says, hopping off the truck. “I just had the math worksheet.” 

“Emma, come set the table for dinner.” That’s their mom, looking like if there was a breeze she’d be blown away by it. Her voice is cold, but Emma doesn’t falter. It’s only when she’s inside that she turns to Adam. “Your dad wants to talk about the truck. He’s in the living room.” 

Adam knows better than to keep them waiting, so he wipes the oil off of his hands as best as he can before going inside. He’s anxious, the way he always is when he enters the double-wide. Emma’s face is carefully neutral, her hair pulled back into a messy imitation of a pony-tail again. Adam wants to fix it, but he’s not going to give Robert Parrish a reason to be angry. 

“What’s the verdict?” Robert Parrish all but grunts. “You were out there a long time.” 

“I gotta get a few part from Boyd’s. I’ll stop before work tonight,” Adam says softly. 

“I ain’t paying for shit,” Robert spits. 

“I know. I can look around the shop for some of it, and I can order the rest out of my paycheck,” Adam immediately replies, already on the defense. He’s trying to avoid an _incident_ directly in front of Emma. He’s been lucky so far; apparently Robert Parrish is less prone to hitting his daughter than his son. But as Emma grows, Robert’s making more comments about how she’s growing up. It sets Adam on edge, and Emma doesn’t quite notice it for what it is, but she’s said she’s felt uncomfortable. It’s just all so fucked up, but Adam’s got two years before he can take Emma and leave. 

“Your mother’s not working. We need that money from you.” Well, Adam knows there’s no way that this is going to work out for him. He knows the answer his dad wants, that the truck just needs a little tune-up, and there’s nothing else that’s not going to piss him off. 

It’s these games that Adam hates, the ones that are designed to be unwinnable. It’s so similar, yet worlds different, from the game Ronan seems intent on playing with Adam. 

What can Adam say to lessen the impact, when it comes? 

“It’s probably going to be about a hundred fifty bucks in total, but I can buy some of the parts over time. I don’t have to fix it all at once,” Adam tries. Robert Parrish stands up, backhands Adam so hard that everything goes white for a second. 

“Pick up another shift sometime this week,” Robert growls. Adam is taller than him, now, but it’s times like these when his father manages to loom over him. Adam thinks that’s the end of it, because Robert has looked away, and he makes the mistake of letting out his breath. “If you wouldn’t spend so much damn time hanging around those raven boys, if you actually cared about this goddamn family, this wouldn’t be a problem.” 

Oh. That’s what this is going to be about. Adam involuntary glances at Emma, whose face has gone pale, frozen in the action of putting a fork down on the table.

“Go wash up before we eat,” Robert says, and Emma scurries from the room. Robert’s voice sounds dangerous now. The only thing Adam will ever be grateful for is that he and his dad are on the same page: Emma doesn’t need to see the worst of it. 

“You ain’t even gonna deny it.” No, Adam isn’t. He hasn’t the last five times Robert has come home mad, needing some reason to take it out on Adam. 

When Robert Parrish finally sits down to dinner, the fourth seat remains open. Emma hides her piece of bread in her lap. She doesn’t know what happened, not exactly, but she heard the thumps and the gasps, and a single strangled cry. Instead of heading to straight to the bathroom to wash up, she had stopped in their bedroom, like she always does, had grabbed the shitty flip phone Adam owns and texted Ronan. Adam doesn’t know, because she always deletes the conversation before he can see, and for as much as Ronan tells Emma he never lies, he’s very good at pretending he doesn’t know the truth. It’s the only thing that makes Emma feel a little less helpless whenever this happens. 

She eats as quickly as she can, slips silently away from the table and back into their bedroom. Adam is holding a towel to his face, still trying to stop the blood from pouring out of his nose. His cheek is already starting to bruise, and he’s hunched over. 

“Can I come with you tonight?” Emma’s voice is timid. Adam grimaces, takes the towel away from his face. Thankfully, his nose has stopped bleeding. 

“Yeah, of course,” Adam says, his voice quiet but not small like it can be during nights like these. Emma silently extends the piece of bread, and Adam accepts it gratefully. 

“I’m going to get a clean towel,” Emma says as Adam nibbles at the food, gently prying the bloody one out of her brother’s hand. Sure enough, she comes back with an old navy rag stained rusty with blood, and Adam gently wipes the fresh blood off of his face. 

He can tell it’s going to be a bad night already. 

Sometimes, he wonders what his father would do if he had an actual reason to be angry. A destructive part of Adam wants to tell his father exactly how he’s been skimming money off of his checks for years, about his plan to emancipate himself, take Emma, and go to college far away. He’s so close; his college counselor says he’s poised to go almost anywhere he wants, and his own research (aided by Gansey) has told him that it’s likely he won’t have to pay.

:: ::

“Fucking hell, Parrish,” Ronan says the second he enters the shitty convenience store. “Give me a minute.” Emma is sitting on the counter, and she allows herself a small smile. She knows Ronan packed Monmouth Manufacturing’s first aid kit, but the act of not bringing it in is enough to keep the rouse going.

When Ronan re-enters, it’s with the first aid kit. 

“Hey, squirt,” he says, ruffling Emma’s hair. She’s doing more math, helping Adam finish up the inventory. “Stop it with the educational shit.” 

Adam looks tense, hunched over the counter and writing what Emma tells him. 

“Take a break, Parrish,” Ronan says as he unceremoniously puts the kit on top of the piece of paper Adam was looking at. 

“I have to finish this, Lynch,” Adam shoots back, but Ronan is already hopping over the counter. “If my manager were here–” 

“She’s never here this late. Jesus, did you even pack your nose?” Ronan says. He’s got Adam’s chin in one hand, is digging through the bag with the other. “You gonna avoid Gansey again?” 

Emma’s head snaps up at that. “You were avoiding Gansey?”

Ronan and Adam share a look. Gansey has been helping Adam develop his own plan, now that junior year is drawing to a close, but he’s still prone to trying to force new ones on Adam every time he sees a new bruise or cut. Emma knows that the plan is that she’s leaving with Adam, because once she saw Adam looking at colleges on a computer at the library and promptly panicked that he was leaving her alone. But she doesn’t know a lot of what planning to leave looks like. She doesn’t know he’s been skimming money, hiding it at Monmouth. It’s better that way, so that she can’t accidentally let anything slip. 

“We had a disagreement,” is what Adam decides to go with, and Ronan just snorts. 

“That’s one way to put it. Shut up and let me patch you up before your nose starts bleeding again.” Ronan is impossibly gentle, despite the scowl on his face. Adam does, lets Ronan swab and bandage and pack and do whatever else Ronan decides Adam needs. 

There was a time when Adam would refuse. 

Adam had met Ronan at Boyd’s Autobody when he was fourteen years old. A six-year-old Emma had been coloring on the counter, Adam’s face had been black and blue, and Ronan had crashed his car. And then, even when the BMW was perfect again, he kept coming back. Ronan brought along Gansey, who had wanted to talk about history and dead Welsh Kings and who thought Adam was smart. The time after that, they brought Noah. Somehow, through a two-month campaign Adam later learned Gansey planned in excruciating detail, Adam found himself amongst the raven boys. At the beginning, Adam wanted them all to leave him the fuck alone. 

Ronan was all rough edges, the sharp breathlessness of a wave pulling your head under the water, Adam thinks. Once the water surrounds you, though, it’s as calming as if you were floating on it. 

This is one of the times when Adam is drowning. 

It’s not that his father hit him, he’s long past the point of being destroyed by the sound of knuckles hitting flesh, it’s that Emma saw some of it. He’s tried so hard to shield her, to keep her from washing away into the same tide that swept Adam so long ago he can’t remember what it’s like to stand on the sand. He knows how that feels, and he can’t… 

To him, Emma has always been the baby who smiled the first time he held her. 

Even now, as she’s doing something on a paper in the harsh lights of the convenience store, her hair, so much lighter than Adam’s, seems to glow. He thinks in a different life he could be like that. Adam thinks about a different life a lot. On his darkest days, he imagines a world in which Robert Parrish learned to use a goddamn condom after the first time. He hates himself for it. Adam can’t resent Emma for existing, because then he would be his father’s son. 

“Hey. You’re, like, a galaxy away,” Ronan says, his hand still on Adam’s chin. “Rejoin the rest of us poor fuckers trapped on the mortal coil.” 

“You’ve been listening to Gansey too much,” Adam mumbles, and it’s enough the see the ghost of a smile in Ronan’s eyes. 

“Speaking of, you know what that fucker said in Latin today?” Ronan says, and suddenly he’s sitting on the counter and life is normal again. 

“Don’t fucking swear,” Emma says, and Ronan immediately gives her a high five. Adam doesn’t even fight it, anymore. 

“Gansey messed up tenses so badly he said the text read ‘he had suffered more in the days yet to come,’ and I thought Greenmantle was gonna banish him to the shadowlands,” Ronan says, snorting a little. 

“You know, you could try not being an asshole during Latin,” Adam suggests, going back to doing inventory. 

“Just because Mountain View barely offers Spanish, doesn’t mean you can hate on Latin,” Ronan says lazily. 

“ _We also have ASL, shithead._ ” Adam signs it all. 

“Talk dirty to me again, Parrish, I dare you,” Ronan shoots back. He’s got something that’s closer to a grin than a smirk on his face, one that’s usually reserved for the youngest Lynch. 

Adam just turns back to work. He lets Ronan play obnoxiously loud word games with Emma to help her study for her spelling quiz, lets him braid her hair into a complicated knot. They give Adam peace do his homework, and throughout his shift Adam finishes most of what he needs to do, and the rest is just reading.

“Need a ride home?” Ronan asks. “You can finish your reading in the car.” There’s a lot that’s unsaid, the “I know you have an early shift tomorrow”s, and the “you’re tired and sore, so please don’t bike”s. 

Adam is too tired to fight with Ronan right now, and he doesn’t want to bike in the dark with Emma on the handlebars. 

They drive home, Ronan’s shitty electronica filling the car along while Emma’s delightedly yells along.

:: ::

Adam has a rare Thursday night off that week. Emma is sound asleep, and so Adam bikes to Nino’s. He’d pulled a hundred dollars out of the college fund that day, which is actually just Adam pulling money out of a coffee tin in Monmouth Manufacturing. It hurts him, but he knows Robert Parrish is going to be looking very closely at the money Adam brings home this week.

The look Gansey had given him had sent a current of shame straight to Adam’s chest. 

Still, Adam doesn’t look at Gansey as he slides into their booth, next to Ronan and across from Noah. He can’t. 

“No squirt tonight?” Ronan asks, looking up from his seemingly crucial task of making the most unstable structure of straws imaginable. 

“Nah. She had ballet at the YMCA after school, so she’s passed out,” Adam answers easily. 

“Damn. Haven’t seen her since Monday. How’d the spelling quiz go?” Ronan continues. Gansey is giving Ronan a Look now, because there’s obviously some sort of conversation he wants to have with Adam, but Ronan does not seem to care. 

“Only got one wrong, but it was one of the extra words her teacher gave her,” Adam answers. 

“I bet it was medieval,” Ronan answers. “I can’t even spell that shit.” Adam lets out one laugh, and that’s when Blue appears.

“You want a coke, Adam?” she asks, hair pulled up yet still incredibly wild. Adam just nods. “Your gross ass pizza is gonna be up soon, Gansey,” 

“You supposed to talk to customers like that, Maggot?” Ronan asks, and Blue just hits him with her notepad. 

“Thanks, Jane,” Gansey says good-naturedly. “Do you work this weekend?” 

“Yeah, but it’s just in the morning,” Blue answers, before she sees another table calling her over. “I’ll be back with your food soon.” 

“So, Adam,” Gansey starts, and Ronan feels Adam stiffen next to him. “Have you given any more thought to what we discussed last Friday?” Ronan places a hand on Adam’s thigh, just briefly. It does nothing to uncoil Adam. 

“I already told you I can’t. I need to know that Emma will be safe,” Adam says, fiddling with his hands. “They’d separate us, Gansey. I can’t… I can’t…”

“He’s not gonna force anything on you,” Ronan practically growls. 

“Waiting until you’re eighteen doesn’t seem…” Uncharacteristically, Gansey falters. “There’s barely been a week when he hasn’t hurt you, these past few months.” 

“I’m not going to have this discussion,” Adam says, his voice detached. “I’m not doing it.” 

“I know you’re concerned about Emma, but I’m also concerned about you.” Adam knows Gansey has rehearsed this line, because he’s fucking heard it before. “Adam, he hasn’t hit her but it’s getting worse for you. You’re—”,

“Gansey,” Ronan practically growls, but Adam is angry, now. How dare he? How can he sit there and look Adam in the face and tell him to leave his sister behind? 

“I’m not leaving her behind,” is what Adam ends up saying, voice shaking and low. Not for the first time, Adam feels like a time bomb. He’s used to those, has lived with one his entire life. But Adam hates being one. 

“I’m not saying that. I’m just saying that you’re not seeing that it’s getting worse, and—” 

“You think I don’t fucking know? I know, Gansey. But unless you have a fucking magical solution that doesn’t involve abandoning Emma, I don’t want to hear it,” Adam spits out. “There’s nothing that can be done. So just drop it.” 

“Adam, there _has_ to be another way,” Gansey says, his voice impossibly soft. 

“Gansey, just let it go,” Noah says, the first time he’s spoken since Adam has arrived. But he also gives Adam one of those long looks, his pale eyes seemingly seeing straight through Adam. 

There’s a long silence. Adam is picking at the table, Ronan is continuing his straw construction, and Gansey is just staring at Adam’s hands. 

“Hey, shithead, stop fucking up the table,” Ronan says, nudging Adam. His voice isn’t harsh. 

The tension isn’t broken, but it’s less so, now. Enough to joke around with Blue, enough to accept a ride from Ronan. 

Enough so that Adam constantly feels like he’s about to snap, but not enough for him to actually break.

:: ::

“Adam?” Ronan’s voice is hoarse, clearly still clinging to sleep. That makes sense, as it’s almost three in the morning. It’s almost two weeks after the Nino’s incident, only about a week after Adam started speaking to Gansey again.

“Hey. Can you come get me? They won’t let me leave unless someone takes me home,” Adam says, voice slightly muffled. 

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” Ronan says, already bolting out of bed. “The fuck happened this time, Parrish?” 

“It’s not that bad. I just needed to get my jaw and shoulder looked at,” Adam explains. “They won’t let me bike home.” 

“Fuck, Parrish, I’m on my way,” Ronan says. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. My jaw is cracked, but my shoulder was just dislocated,” Adam says. “Emma is okay. I didn’t bring her with. She’s asleep.” Ronan knows Emma is at 300 Fox Way, but he’s not going to call Adam’s bullshit until he sees he’s okay. 

“You biked to the hospital with a dislocated shoulder?” Ronan all but groans. “Adam—”

“I had no other option. See you soon.”

Adam hangs up. Ronan gets to the hospital in ten minutes flat. Adam is sitting on the curb with his bike. He’s got one arm in a sling, stitches through his eyebrow, and an impressively large bruise coloring the right side of his jaw. 

Ronan just leans over, opens the passenger side, and then gets out of the car. He makes quick work of folding Adam’s bike into the trunk, and then sinks back into the driver’s side. Adam has the arm that’s not in the sling wrapped around his stomach.

“What happened?” Ronan asks. He normally wouldn’t, but normally Adam wouldn’t call Ronan to pick him up at the hospital. 

“I forgot to tell him about a late shift. He waited up,” is all Adam offers. Ronan knows the truth. 

“Emma said her teacher called the house today,” Ronan says, and Adam curses his own memory. Ronan had picked up Emma from ballet and brought her to Boyd’s today. “About something that happened with a boy in her class.”

“I don’t know what you’re implying, but—” Adam’s voice is thick with his Henrietta accent. 

“I know, Adam. Emma is with the witches tonight. You purposely didn’t call,” Ronan says. His voice is harsh, and he can’t bite back anger. It’s not at Adam, not exactly, but at the whole thing. In Adam’s place, if Emma were Matthew, he would have done the same thing. But it doesn’t make it better when the aftermath is staring Ronan in the face. 

“Yeah. It was the only thing I could do.” Adam isn’t looking at Ronan, but his voice is burning hot with anger.

“No. You could have stayed with us. You didn’t need to go back there,” Ronan argues. 

“I would have had to go back eventually and—”

“Whatever. It happened. Is this gonna fuck up your work schedule this week?” Ronan asks, trying his best to avoid a complete blowout at three in the morning. 

“No. As long as I don’t get hit in the face for a while, the jaw should be fine. I can manage with the shoulder,” Adam says stubbornly. Ronan doesn’t want to think about Adam at the factory or the garage aggravating the shit out of his shoulder, so he just clenches his jaw hard enough that it pops. 

“Do you want me to pick up Emma from the witches tomorrow morning?” That’s not what Ronan’s actually asking. Ronan is asking if Adam wants time to let the bruises die down a little before seeing Emma. 

“No, it’s fine.” After three years of really understanding what it’s like at home, and an entire life of a brother mottled with bruises and resigned fear, this won’t faze her. It makes Adam hate himself just a little bit. If he were better, Emma never would have learned how to sneak food from the table, never would learn when to hide in their room with a locked door. 

“Text Blue that you’re okay,” Ronan says. He knows there’s no way he’s going back to sleep tonight. He’s going to have to explain to Gansey, is going to have to diffuse that situation when all he wants to do is punch something, someone, because otherwise he’s going to explode. 

Parrish doesn’t even see that it’s a problem, not really. He’s so focused on getting out the way the he wants to that his vision has tunneled so far he’s not even registering what’s happening right now. Adam is worrying about savings and moving Emma and the law, not broken bones and bruised skin.

“You want food?” Ronan asks, as Henrietta speeds by. 

“I should get home,” Adam responds, biting his lip. “They’re probably waiting up.”

“Okay.” They don’t talk the rest of the drive, Ronan stopping the car just far enough away that no one in the trailer could see the car. He takes Adam’s bike out of the trunk, helps him upright it and rests his hand on Adam’s back until Adam walks away. 

Ronan drives. 

The music is loud enough so that he can’t hear the wind in his ears and the screeching of the tires.

:: ::

It’s a Saturday night at Monmouth. Adam has just gotten off from the Auto Shop, a secret shift which means that Emma has been chilling with them for a few hours, and his hands are covered in grease. Ronan had gone to pick Adam up, still against Adam biking, even though it’s been over a week since the early morning hospital excursion. Emma has no idea.

One of the small miracles of Adam Parrish, Ronan thinks, is his ability to hide horrible things underneath the usual awful surface of his life. Emma knows Robert Parrish hit his son again, but she doesn’t know it warranted a hospital verison; out of curiosity once, Ronan had asked how bad it was to Emma, just two days after a similar night, and she said it was just normal bad, bruises and yelling. Part of him wants to shake Adam’s shoulders and yell at him for hiding it from Emma, the other part understands what Adam is hiding her from. 

It’s too much for an eight-year-old. It’s too much for Adam. 

He thinks that it makes it all a little worse for Adam, that it’s pushing Adam closer and closer to the cliff that he can’t even see. There’s only so much he can take, Ronan knows it, the hours of exhaustion and work and squirreling away money and worrying about Emma and dreading what he’s walking into is wearing and wearing at Adam. It’s a little destructive, a little cruel, but Ronan thinks something has got to give, and that it’s going to give soon.

But not tonight.

When he and Adam enter the apartment, Emma is busy playing with Blue’s hair, her hands moving nimbly as she wrangles the short strands into a crown braid. She pauses, showing Blue where to hold her hair, and then her arms are around Adam’s waist.

“Hello to you, too,” Adam says, pats the top of her head and tries not to get the dark oil on her hair. “What’s up, Emma Bug?”

“I’m doing Blue’s hair and then Noah’s,” she says, scampering back. 

“Take a shower. You smell like the BP Oil Spill,” Ronan says, as Adam flops onto one of the couches. 

“Why would you say that.” Blue makes it clear that it’s not a question, glaring at Ronan, who just gestures at Adam’s hands, which are stained grey and black. 

“Save the lecture, Maggot. Parrish, for Christ’s sake. Shower, eat, then pass out. Get with the program,” Ronan says, kicking at the ankle dangling off the couch. Adam manages to press himself up and stumbles in the direction of the bathroom/kitchen, shutting the door behind him. Ronan just sighs. 

“It’s fine. I think the coveralls look hot, too,” Noah says, appearing right behind Ronan, who jumps at the sudden reappearance. 

“I’m going to throw you out the window,” Ronan announces, and then goes to do just that, until Emma’s hand is on his wrist. 

“No,” she says, and it’s enough to stop him and for Noah to disappear. “He’ll get hurt.”

“No he won’t,” Ronan responds. Emma isn’t completely clear on the whole Noah being dead thing, but she has no trouble accepting his random appearances/disappearances and his refusals to eat anything. 

“No,” she repeats, and Ronan just sighs. 

“Later, Czerny,” he promises to the open air, knowing that Noah can probably hear him. Emma appears satisfied, goes back to Blue’s hair. Her own hair is a wild mess, and Ronan knows Adam will appreciate it if he brushes and tames it into something that will hold for the next day. 

That’s how, when Adam emerges from the bathroom/kitchen, he walks in on a hair-braiding train. Ronan almost drops the complicated system of parted hair between his knuckles, because Adam is just wearing the coveralls, tied at the waist, happy trail on display until he bends over to search for clothes in his backpack. 

Ronan thinks his heart stops temporarily. 

He doesn’t have _time_ for these stupid feelings, feelings that don’t even matter because even if Adam reciprocates, even if somehow, impossibly, Adam wants Ronan as much as Ronan wants him, it’s not a possibility. Adam won’t risk it, not while he’s under Robert Parrish’s roof. Ronan thinks if he compresses his feelings, shoves them somewhere deep and dark and cold inside of themselves, they’ll become so dense, so hard and unbreakable, that it was like they were never there at all. 

It slips through his grasp, every time, spreading further and thinner across his entire soul. 

So he smiles at Adam, turns away as Adam pulls the clean shirt on; he finishes braiding Emma’s hair, gets her set up at the kitchen table with a new book and starts helping Adam and Gansey chop vegetables to make some sort of stir-fry before they watch a movie. 

“We going to watch a Disney movie?” Emma asks, turning the page. 

“If you set the table,” Adam says, and Emma carefully places a homemade bookmark into the binding of the page she’s reading and puts it on the counter. She makes quick work of the job, Noah helping as much as he can. 

They’re all sitting down. 

They talk about nothing at all. Emma got 100% on her math quiz, Gansey has gone down some weird rabbit hole into Welsh history, Noah made a pillow fort with Emma, and Adam might get a raise at the garage. Chainsaw has stopped eating the the belt loops off of Gansey’s khakis, and Ronan made it through midterms without failing a single class.

If Adam falls asleep two minutes into the movie, head slumping onto Ronan’s shoulder, no one says anything. It’s fine. It’s totally fine.

:: ::

“Parrish. Get in the car,” is all Ronan says. He’s dropped Emma off with the witches for the next few hours, because they need to talk and they need to talk now.

“Fuck _off_. Where’s Emma?” Adam responds, trying to use the sleeve of a coverall to wipe away the grease, the sweat, but it does nothing except smudge his skin an even darker color than it already was. 

“Learning hexes or some shit. Get in,” Ronan says, and leaves no room for argument. Adam does, but it’s clear from the coal smouldering under his eyes that his anger is one spark away from total combustion. 

“What the fuck is going on?” Adam asks, and Ronan just scoffs. 

“You haven’t been to school all week,” Ronan says, no preamble. “What the fuck, Parrish?”

“I haven’t had a choice.” Adam’s voice sounds wrecked. “I’ve been doing my school work.” 

“Take money out of the fucking jar. Adam, this is the most backward bullshit I have ever seen you do,” Ronan says, tries to soften the blow by using Adam’s first name. He wants to tear his hair out; Adam values his education more than anything that’s not Emma. It’s that, that fucking turn around, that’s ignited the anger in Ronan; Adam would rather give up a part of himself than dip, just a little bit, into something that’s still a year away. It’s the beginning of a slope Ronan can’t watch Adam go down, the beginning of Robert Parrish’s game to keep Adam locked in Henrietta, in the trailer park, forever.

“If I open the jar once, soon enough there won’t be anything in it at all.” Adam’s voice is cold. “How the fuck did you even know?”

Ronan isn’t about to rat out Emma. What he’s about to say isn’t technically a lie, because it’s how the rest of them found out there’s a problem, but he’s known since Emma told him on Monday. 

“Sargent,” he answers. “She hasn’t seen you in homeroom this week.”

“It’s just this week. My dad sprained his wrist at the factory, and the only way they wouldn’t fire him is if I covered his shifts this week,” Adam explains, hands twisting in his lap. “He’ll be back next week.”

“You’ve worked at the factory with a hell of a lot more,” Ronan gets out, voice a growl. “They don’t give a fuck about that?”

“Those didn’t happen at the factory, Lynch.” It’s clear from Adam’s tone that Ronan is a millimeter away from a landmine. Fuck it. 

“What’s going to happen if they lay him off? He gonna make you quit school? What the fuck happens then, Parrish?” Ronan’s eyes are on the road. He knows Adam can’t see beyond what’s facing him down in the next day, the next week, but Ronan knows Adam is on the edge of something he can’t pull back from. All of the planning, all of the saving, it means nothing if he doesn’t have a goddamn way out. Adam is always saying he wants to do it himself, needs to do it his way, but he can’t see that this jeopardizes all of that. 

“My dad barely graduated middle school before he was working full time. I’m lucky I’ve made it this far before shit has even mildly hit the fan.” Adam’s voice is empty. 

“Are you just talking shit with Gansey then?” Ronan knows he’s stepped too far. 

“You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” Adam’s voice is dangerous. He takes a deep breath. “You don’t understand what it’s like. You can’t.” 

“I know you like to pretend you’re sacrificing yourself to save Emma, but you’re just ruining yourself.” Ronan has pulled over, is now turned to look at Adam. 

“Don’t you fucking dare. Don’t bring Emma into this.” Adam is looking out the window, refuses to meet Ronan’s eyes. “You think I wanted to miss school? You think I want to fucking work in the trailer factory at all?” Adam lets out a hollow laugh. “I’m doing what I have to do. You wouldn’t fucking understand, because you’ve never had to do a damn thing in your life.”

“You know what I don’t understand? I don’t understand why the fuck you’re so set on doing this the stupid way. You could be out if you just let someone goddamn help.” Ronan makes sure to keep his voice calm. 

“I’m not going to belong to you.” Adam smacks the dashboard. “Why can’t you just leave me the fuck alone?”

“I don’t know why you think we should be able to sit back and do nothing.” Ronan reaches out, starts the car again. He is deliberately looking everywhere but Adam. “We couldn’t stand to see the squirt if she got hurt, but I don’t know why the fuck you think it’s any easier when it’s you. Look, don’t fucking jump down my throat yet. If you get kicked out of high school, or withdraw, or whatever, your entire plan is gone. You’re never getting out.” 

“What if I can’t stop it?” Adam’s voice is shaking, his Henrietta accent slipping in suddenly. “If he gets laid off, if he can’t find another job, it ain’t gonna be my mama who picks up the slack. He ain’t gonna let me leave with Emma. What the fuck was I supposed to do?” 

“I would have fucking helped. I would have turned in your work, or, or I don’t fucking know.” Ronan keeps his voice soft. Adam gives him that look that he sometimes does, when it’s just Ronan and Adam, no Emma, no Gansey, no nothing. The one that makes Ronan almost hope that something could happen. 

“It’s the only thing I could have done. It won’t happen again.” Adam’s voice is hollow. “Let’s go. I have to get Emma home.” 

“You know this conversation isn’t gonna be over. Gansey’s losing his fucking mind,” Ronan says, but he pulls back onto the road and starts driving. 

Adam lets out a sigh, leans his head back against the rest in the way that lets Ronan see how much his adam’s apple is bobbing. This is one of the times where Adam Parrish looks past the point of exhaustion. 

“I’m just so fucking tired. I’ll figure something out, tell him the school is on my ass or something.” 

Ronan knows better than to argue this again. 

“Hey.” Ronan’s hand finds Adam’s. He ignores the voice in his head that immediately whispers _that’s gay_. “We’ll help. Whatever you need.” 

Adam gives him a soft smile in return. He’s just so fucking tired that he can’t continue the fight; every muscle aches from the hours of hauling and assembling and not being able to _think_. He doesn’t want to to have to fight with Ronan. He’s spent the whole week trying to shove himself somewhere deep inside where his father can’t find him. Wait, that doesn’t make sense. Fuck it. Adam thinks that amidst the mess of synapses and tendons and molecular junctions that allow him to be, there’s something that’s blackened, burned out, and that’s what his father can see. It’s because of these parts of him that Adam has had to swallow his anger every fucking time he comes back to the trailer this week to find his dad drunk and angry at Adam for doing the thing he doesn’t even want to fucking do. 

“Adam.” Ronan says Adam’s name like it’s a prayer. “It’s going to work out.” 

“You don’t know that.” Adam finally, finally looks over to Ronan. “I’m so tired, Ronan.” 

Ronan leans closer, eyes searching. Adam doesn’t back away. That’s all the invitation Ronan needs. His lips are against Adam’s; he smells oil and sweat but tastes Coca-cola and summer on Adam’s lips. 

Something has changed.

:: ::

“Do we tell Emma?” Adam has his head in Ronan’s lap, who’s too busy playing with Adam’s hair to listen to what he’s saying.

“Hmm?” Ronan asks, his fingers lingering near Adam’s ears. It’s two weeks since their fight turned not-fight; Robert Parrish wasn’t laid off, and so Adam goes back to school. Ronan talks to Gansey to come up with an emergency plan in case it happens again. Adam doesn’t know that plans exists.

“Should we tell Emma that we’re… dating?” Adam hesitates with his word choice. He sits up, because he can tell this is going to be a serious conversation, but Ronan just pulls Adam so that he’s in his lap and buries his nose in Adam’s shoulder.

“Dunno. Do you think she’ll tell your dad?” Ronan asks, voice gruff. He nips Adam’s ear, before pressing a kiss right where the ear meets jaw line. 

“No. Do you think… do you think she’ll be mad?” Adam asks, his voice quiet. 

“Why the hell would she be mad?” Ronan asks, scoffing. When Adam doesn’t reply, he knows he’s missing something. “What’s happening in that nerd head of yours?”

“There was a bit, when we all first started… it had always just been me and her. She got mad, because I… because—” Adam twists his fingers, ducks his head. Ronan just grabs Adam’s hands, waits a few breaths. 

“She’s older, now. She knows how to share,” Ronan murmurs. “Trust me. It’ll be easier than all that, because she still has all of us.”

“But what if it’s not? What if she thinks I’m leaving her behind?” Adam gets out, the words tasting sour and sharp on his tongue. He’s already so guilty about everything that’s happened, that she’s had to see. 

“Sounds like this isn’t just about us being a thing,” Ronan says, leans Adam further into him. 

“What if she doesn’t want to go with me?” Adam has never said it out loud before, but his nightmares are always the same: Emma not wanting to go, not understanding the plan that Adam has worked so hard to execute. What if she doesn’t want to leave what she’s always known? 

“She will. Adam, every time I drive Emma from the YMCA to Boyd’s, she asks me the same question: is it time yet?” Ronan hates breathing out a secret that isn’t his own, but Emma has told him too many to keep from Adam. “She doesn’t know the plan, which is smart of you, but she knows there is one. She doesn’t want to stay with them any more than you do.” There’s a part that Ronan won’t say, that for as much as Adam hides from Emma, she hides how much she knows. 

Ronan can’t look at the boy who’s always on the verge of exhaustion and breakdown and tell him all that Emma understands. He can’t tell Adam all the times that she’s cried because of what’s happened the night or hours before, can’t tell her all the times she’s asked Ronan to help Adam. 

Last night, when Ronan had told Gansey that they were dating, Gansey had responded with a question: _Are you prepared for what you’re getting into?_ Ronan has known what he was doing since he first saw Adam at Boyd’s. Adam is no less skinny than he was then, but he’s known since he’s met Adam Parrish what he’s been falling into. He knows that it’s not just Parrish, that when he started this it was a commitment. He knows that being with Adam means that Emma is a part of it. 

He had told Gansey this. Gansey had smiled. 

“She does?” Adam asks, voice hoarse and barely audible. “I…” 

“It’s not a failure on your part. I’m just saying that we can tell her, or we can not. It’s up to you.”

:: ::

They tell Emma the day that everything falls apart. Adam is about to leave Monmouth to work a secret shift, but first he sits Emma on a couch, sandwiches her between Ronan and himself.

“Remember how I said we had something to talk about today, Emma?” Adam starts, his hands fidgeting. Ronan doesn’t think he’s ever seen Adam this visibly nervous. 

“Yeah. What’s going on?” Emma’s face is pale, her eyes wide with worry. “Is something happening with Mom and Dad?” 

“Jesus, no,” Ronan cuts in. Adam shoots him a look.

“It’s nothing bad. It’s actually good,” Adam corrects, and though he never takes his eyes off of Emma, his smile is warm and gentle. “Uh…”

“Adam and I are dating,” Ronan says, rips off the bandaid. Adam shoots him a look, before his attention is totally on Emma.

“Like, boyfriends?” Emma confirms, a crease forming between her eyebrows. Adam just nods. His hands are shaking. “Cool.” 

Adam looks like he’s seen a non-Noah ghost. 

“Really?” he asks, voice shaking. 

“Yeah,” Emma says plainly, shoving her hands into her lap. “But… Dad.” 

“We’re not going to talk about it around Dad,” Adam says, his voice serious. “I know he says… he says a lot of stuff, but you know that it’s not true?”

“Yeah. Mrs. Martin taught us about it when we learned about the Supreme Court,” Emma says plainly. “I just don’t want… Dad would be so mad.” 

“That’s why he’s not going to know,” Adam says. “I promise he’s not going to find out.” 

“Mrs. Martin says that as long as someone makes you happy, you should be able to marry them,” is what Emma responds with. “I think that Mom and Dad shouldn’t be allowed to be married.” 

Ronan is halfway through a laugh before he manages to choke it off. 

“Emma,” Adam says, his voice serious. “Me and Ronan aren’t going to be like them. I promise you.” 

“Then it’s cool.” 

Ronan watches the tension leave Adam, even as he rushes out the door for work. Emma turns to Ronan, an impish grin on her face.

“Are we still going to get ice cream?” she asks, a secret from Adam’s hidden shifts that he never has to know about. 

“Yeah. Let me see if the old man and the ghost wanna come.”

:: ::

Emma is sitting between Gansey and Noah in a booth at an ice cream parlor, a smile wide on her face, when it suddenly goes carefully blank. She slinks down trying to hide her frame from the window, but it’s too late.

By the time Ronan notices anything has changed, Mrs. Parrish is in front of him.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Mrs. Parrish asks, southern accent prominent. Emma slinks farther down at the table. “Where’s Adam?” 

“Uh…” Emma says, continues to stutter. She looks, eyes wide with fear, to Ronan. 

“He’s not s’posed to be working right now,” Mrs. Parrish continues. Emma bites her lips. “What are you doing with these boys, Emma Grace? I’m not gonna ask you again.” 

“I… I… We’re hanging out.” Emma says, her voice quiet. She’s looking at her hands. 

“Where’s your brother?” Mrs. Parrish continues. Emma doesn’t answer. “Emma, where is Adam?” 

“He’s at th’ gas station store,” Emma says, her voice a whisper. 

“He doesn’t work there,” Mrs. Parrish says, but when she looks at her daughter’s face she knows. “You tell him your pa’s going to be mad as shit when he finds out he’s been hiding money.” 

Then she’s gone again. 

As soon as the bell rings, and Mrs. Parrish is out of sight, Emma starts crying. Gansey’s arms pull Emma to his chest, and she clings to him. 

“It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault,” he says, looks over her head to Ronan for any idea of what the fuck they should do. Ronan just disappears, his phone in his hand.

When he comes back, Emma is wiping the tears from her eyes. 

“I talked to Adam. I’m going to drop Emma off at Boyd’s when Adam starts his shift. Adam says he knows what he’s going to do,” Ronan says, sounds wholly unconvinced. It’s also obvious that he’s not telling them everything. 

“That’s it?” Gansey’s voice is confused. Ronan shoots Gansey a pleading look, something so rare that Gansey shuts it. 

Emma just shakes her head. 

“He’s gonna… he’s gonna…” But she can’t force the words out. 

She doesn’t say another word until she’s at Boyd’s. She runs straight to Adam, wraps her arms around his waist and doesn’t let go. Adam looks over his head to Ronan. The message is clear.

 _Keep your phone on tonight. I promise I’m going to be okay._

Ronan didn’t believe Adam when he said it over the phone, doesn’t believe it now.

:: ::

“Adam?” There’s fifteen minutes left of Adam’s shift at Boyd’s. Emma has been silent the whole time, and Adam hears his own doom in his ears. He already has a plan, a plan to let Emma leave it all unscathed, but it does nothing to relieve the anxiety depressing his chest to the point of dizziness.

“Adam, I see dad’s car,” Emma says, and it sounds like she’s about to cry. Adam rolls out from under the car he’s working on, and he sees that Emma’s eyes are rimmed with red and her lip is trembling. So Adam pulls her in for a hug, rests his chin on her head. Adam takes a breath. 

“Emma, when we get home, you go straight into the room. You lock the door. You call Ronan, ask him to pick you up. You sneak out of the window, and you meet him where Dad can’t see. No matter what you… no matter what happens to me. Do you understand?” Adam’s voice is serious. It cracks at the end of the question.

“Adam, no—” Emma starts, and Adam cuts her off with a choked noise.

“Emma, there isn’t time. You have to. You have to promise me,” Adam says, because Robert Parrish is slamming the door of his truck, now. 

“I promise,” Emma whispers. 

“Get in the goddamn car, Emma” is all Robert says, more like roars. Emma scurries away. “Boyd,” he calls. From the office, Adam’s boss emerges. “How many hours is Adam working a week?”

“Twelve,” Boyd replies, and Adam feels his last hope shatter. Why couldn’t Boyd have lied? “You can clock out now, Adam,” he says, voice uneasy. He doesn’t really like Robert Parrish, but not enough so that he’s going to get in the middle of this latest blow-up. Boyd will do annoying things, like ask Adam about school and keep ice packs in the community freezer, but he won’t actually do jack shit about anything that matters. 

It makes Adam hate him a little bit. He wants to get out himself, but Boyd doesn’t have to make it harder at every turn. God, why couldn’t he have just fucking lied? 

“You little shit,” Robert hisses in his ear, grip on Adam’s arm tight as he finishes punching out. He grabs his bookbag, and then his father is hauling him to the truck. Emma is already sitting on the far right side, and Robert shoves Adam in the middle. Adam is fine with that; there’s a buffer between her and Robert.

“Sir, I—” Adam tries, but his father, without taking his eyes off of the road, backhands Adam so hard he sees stars.

“I don’t want to hear your fuckin’ excuses,” Robert spits. “Just shut up until we get back.” 

Adam does. 

As soon as they pull up to the trailer, Adam gives Emma a look, slips her his cellphone. While Robert is focused on shoving Adam into the dirt, Emma slips past their mother, through the trailer to their shared room. From the dust, Adam smiles just a little before he peels himself up, just for Robert to kick at him, directing him to the trailer. 

Adam makes it up the steps, and when the door opens a kick to Adam’s back sends him sprawling inside. The door slams behind Robert. Adam scrambles to his feet, knowing that staying down is worse, doesn’t want to be accused of faking it when he actually can’t get up again.

“How much have you been hiding?” Robert asks, as he crosses the small distance toward Adam. Adam’s mother is in the kitchen, washing dishes. Robert’s fists are on Adam’s collar, Adam’s back is slammed against the wall the main room shares with Adam and Emma’s bedroom. Alice Parrish turns away, picks up another plate. 

“I—” Adam starts, can’t finish because Robert decides Adam hasn’t answered quickly enough and throws him against the floor. Adam’s forehead hits the edge of his father’s arm chair. 

“We feed you, we give you a goddamn roof over your head, and for what? You should be grateful, you worthless piece of shit! But how do you repay us? You go and steal money behind our backs.” Robert is undoing his belt, now, rips Adam’s shirt and pants off brutally and cleanly. 

Everything is spinning, and when Adam tries to roll over, to face his father, to try and make this just a little bit better, all it gets him is a few kicks to the ribs that send him sprawling back against the floor of the trailer. Then Robert is pinning him, knees pressing against the back of Adam’s thighs. 

Adam doesn’t know if it’s after the first or fifth or tenth strike of the belt that he starts screaming. But it happens, and his only coherent thought is that he hopes to Ronan’s god that Emma can’t hear this.

:: ::

Emma hears the thump of a body hitting the wall next to her as soon as she gets her shaky fingers to finally dial the right number. Her heart is pounding so loudly she feels it in her forehead, can barely breathe with the the loud, dull sounds of fists against flesh, of Robert screaming and Adam begging.

Ronan picks up on the first ring. 

“Ronan?” Emma knows her voice sounds small. “Adam said…” Emma lets out a noise that sounds like half a whine, half a wheeze. The walls are thin, and Emma hear the first crack of Robert’s belt. “Please.”

“Emma what’s going on? I’m on my way.” Ronan’s voice is trying its best so sound calm, but there’s an edge to it. When Emma just lets out another noise, Ronan lets out an exhale. “Please, Emma. Do I need to call the police?”

“Adam said to call you. He said to ask you to stop at the edge, where Dad can’t see, to pick me up, but… but—” Emma can’t finish, because Adam is crying. It’s like he’s choking on his own screams. “Ronan, he’s killing him. Adam is… he’s…”

“Okay. Emma, I’m calling the police. Can you safely get to the front of the park? I’ll be there in five minutes.” Ronan’s voice is now eerily calm. 

“Yeah. I’m climbing out of the window. I’ll be out by the mailboxes,” Emma whispers. 

“I’ll call you back in two minutes, okay?” Ronan says. “Emma, it’s going to be okay.” And then he hangs up. Emma crawls out of the window, sneaks silently and quietly around trailers until she can’t see their own anymore, and then she runs. 

She’s almost to the mailboxes when the phone rings again.

“I’m outside.” Emma bites her lip, sits behind a bush where she knows Robert Parrish won’t ever look. “I’m in the bushes by the mailboxes.” 

“Okay. That’s good, Emma. There’s police and paramedics on their way, and I’m just turning onto the road. When I get there, I need your help, okay?” Ronan pauses. Emma just breathes raggedly on the other end. “Emma?”

“Yeah, sorry,” Emma gets out. She feels the tears start to fall now. Now that she isn’t near the trailer. 

“It’s okay. I need you to stay in my car with the doors locked until the police get there. You need to show them where to go when they arrive. Okay?” Ronan asks, and Emma can’t respond. It doesn’t matter, because Ronan is there, and Emma crawls out of the bushes. Ronan hands her his keys, sits her in the driver’s seat, and shows her how to lock and unlock the doors. Then he runs towards the Parrish’s double-wide. 

When he gets in the line of sight, Robert Parrish is dangling Adam outside the trailer by his collar.

“Where the fuck is she? You think you know better than us, do you? Think you can hide her from her own parents?” Robert screams, and Ronan stops short. Adam’s eyes are barely open; one because of the rapid swelling, the other probably a result of what also caused the gushing cut on his forehead. Adam’s got nothing on but his boxers, his back a mess of blood and welts ringed with bruising. Ronan can’t see Adam’s front, but he can guess. Adam is letting out a low whine, seemingly unable to draw enough oxygen to scream.

“M’ sorry,” Adam slurs out, but that does nothing to appease Robert Parrish, and before Ronan can stop it, he drops Adam. 

Ronan is rushing forward right as Adam’s head hits the railing and he falls limp into the dirt. There’s no more noise.

“Get up,” Robert Parrish spits. “I know when you’re faking, Adam.” Ronan is closing the distance; it’s clear Adam isn’t faking, because after a few seconds of unconsciousness, he’s groaning and whimpering as he tries to pry himself out of the dirt. But he just falls back down, not even an inch off of the ground. But that’s when Ronan ends up face to face with _him_. “What the fuck do you want?” 

“To do this.” And then Ronan shoves his first into Robert Parrish’s face. 

By the time a cop pulls Ronan off of Robert Parrish, he’s got a bloody nose and a cut on his forehead but Robert Parrish looks a lot worse. 

Someone is shoving Ronan’s face against the trailer, hauling his arms behind his back and snapping on handcuffs. Ronan doesn’t want to fight, doesn’t want to make this worse, but his head faces Adam. 

Adam hasn’t gotten up. There are paramedics kneeling by Adam, turning him on his back. His eyes are barely open, but he isn’t responding to their questions. He lets out that whine again when they turn him, and they they have to quickly put him on his side so he can vomit bile into the dirt. 

Someone grabs Ronan by the shoulder, starts to move him towards a cop car, when Ronan hears:

“Sir, have you been drinking?” And that sets off the anger inside of Ronan again.

“No, he hasn’t fucking been drinking, his dad—” but there’s a cop moving him, telling Ronan to just shut up, but then Emma is there. There’s a cop trailing behind her, even as she wraps her arms around Ronan’s middle.

“No,” she says, looking the cop deadass in the eyes. “He called you. He helped,” Emma argues. 

“Is it true? Did you call the cops on Robert Parrish?” The cop all but sighs, already unlocking the handcuffs.

“Yeah. I got here right when he threw Adam down the stairs. He was going to go after him again,” Ronan says, voice gravelly. The cop releases Ronan. 

“We’re gonna need an official statement. Don’t leave.” But Ronan is already running towards Adam, only to be intercepted by a paramedic.

“Sir, we need space to work,” she says, one gloved palm facing Ronan. “We need to focus on helping Adam right now.” 

“What’s wrong? What’s happening?” Emma asks. When she sees Adam, her eyes widen. “Oh. Oh. _Oh_.” The next thing that comes out of Emma’s mouth is a high-pitched whine, the same as her brother. 

“Mountain View General,” is all the paramedic says before she climbs into the ambulance. The two paramedics on the ground have Adam on a stretcher, and together they maneuver Adam into the back. Then the doors slam shut. Emma lets out another noise, this time strangled and low. 

“Where’s Adam?” Emma doesn’t recognize her own voice. “Where’s he going? I want to go—” Ronan just manages to grab Emma around the waist before she can try to open the doors of the ambulance.

“We’ll meet him there. It’s going to be fine; he’s going to be fine. We’ll see him soon,” Ronan says, variants of the same idea over and over and over whispered into blond hair until Emma stops fighting him. He’s not sure if it’s because of him, or just because the ambulance is out of sight. It’s then that there’s a hand on his shoulder.

Ronan turns around. It’s a police officer.

“Give me one second,” Ronan says. “I need to call someone.” Ronan glances down at Emma, who has gone from trying to escape to clinging to Ronan. The police officer follows his gaze, and gives Ronan a tight nod. Ronan just pries his phone out of his pocket, finds Gansey’s name.

“Gansey?” Ronan’s voice is short. “Gansey, you need to go to Mountain View Hospital. Me and Emma will be there soon, but Adam is there.” There’s a pause. “You know why.” Another break. “Yeah, call them. I’ll be there in like half an hour. Bye.”

A cop pries Emma off of Ronan, brings her over to his car and sits in the backseat with her. Ronan keeps one eye on the car, making sure they aren’t taking her into custody or something. But he answers the questions he’s asked, about Robert Parrish and Adam and Emma. Ronan doesn’t say anything about Alice Parrish, knows the only way he can keep this from fucking up Adam’s shit is if the police don’t remove them directly from Alice Parrish’s custody. Alice will let Adam leave quietly, more importantly will let him take Emma with him. 

Ten minutes later, Emma is the passenger seat of Ronan’s car, and they’re driving to the hospital. 

“I didn’t tell them about Mom,” Emma breathes out, as soon as the doors are closed. “Adam told me that I shouldn’t. A while ago.” 

“Good. That’s good,” Ronan gets out. “What did the cop ask you about?”

“What happened, and what dad’s like, and if he’s hit me. If he’s hit Adam before. I told him that he came to Adam’s work mad, that Adam told me to leave and to call you. I told them the truth; he hasn’t hit me, not really. He hits Adam a lot, though. I just… Adam wasn’t… he… ” 

“He’s going to be okay. They’re taking care of him,” Ronan promises. 

Ronan has no idea if Adam is okay.

:: ::

Adam doesn’t remember much of what happens after his cheek hits the Virginia dirt. He blinks, and there’s suddenly there’s hands on him, turning him over. It makes the sky spin, and Adam thinks he vomits. He can barely register anything other than the searing pain consuming his ribs, his back, that he doesn’t realize he’s trying to move until there are hands pushing against him, keeping him firmly in the dirt. His back is in the dirt, and it’s agony.

Adam opens his mouth, tries to say something, to make sure Emma is okay, but he realizes he’s already making noises. He can barely breathe, is whining and wheezing with the pain of it.

Adam blinks. When his eyes open again, he’s laying down on something else, there are hands all over him, something on his face. There’s something keeping Adam down when he tries to move, a hand covering his own when he hears his own breathing pick up in his right ear. That’s odd.

“Adam, you’re safe, you’re in an ambulance, I need you to relax—” 

Adam understands, this time, that he passes out. 

The next time, his swim to consciousness is much slower. He blinks, sees bright lights, blinks again and there’s a face leaning over his. He realizes he’s moving, but he’s also lying down. That doesn’t make sense.

_“Doctor, we need a CT, keep an OR open just in case. Patient has been in and out of—”_

Adam blinks.

_“3 ribs broken, severe concussion, need to disinfect his back before we can—”_

Blinks again.

 _”You did well, Adam. Go back to sleep.”_ The face swimming above his is one he doesn’t recognize, but it looks kind. 

Adam does.

:: ::

Adam comes to slowly. It’s dark, lights purposely low. It takes a few seconds before everything he blink the blurriness away from his eyes enough to realize how dizzy he is. The room is slowly lilting, and trying to focus his eyes or move his head sends the slightly nauseating waves into a full spiral.

It takes everything Adam has not to retch. He knows that’s a bad idea, can feel it in the way his entire body is heavy and sore, on the verge of exploding with pain. 

“Hey,” a voice says gently. Adam realizes someone is holding his hand. “Don’t try to move.” Adam knows that voice. “You with me, Parrish?”

“Ronan,” Adam groans, realizes his voice is muffled by something on his face. Slowly, Adam reaches a hand towards his face, but Ronan stops it before it’s even halfway there.

“Leave that be. You need it,” is all the explanation Ronan gives. Adam just manages to tilt his head, now. Ronan is smiling, a small thing that Adam thinks would look watery even if Adam’s vision wasn’t swimming.

“Ronan,” Adam tries again, realizes that it hurts. Ronan squeezes his hand. “Emma?” 

“She’s okay… she’s outside with Gansey and Blue right now. Do you want me to get her?” Ronan asks. His face is pinched, and the more Adam focuses the more he realizes how tightly Ronan is wound right now. 

“Don’ want her to see me this bad,” Adam mumbles. He finally manages to get a hand up to his face, pulls the oxygen mask down to his neck. “What’s the damage?”

“Jesus fuck, leave that on,” Ronan says, hand moving to replace the mask. Adam turns his head petulantly, regrets it when the world whites out for a second. When he has control of his brain again, the mask is firmly back against his mouth. “Yeah, that’s why we’re going to keep that on, dumbass.”

Adam lets out a groan. 

“You have a few broken ribs, and your dad did a number on your back. You’re concussed as hell, if you haven’t figured that out already,” Ronan says, eyes sharpness dialed back by the water pooling in his eyes. “And you’ve gone deaf in your left ear.”

“Fuck,” Adam mumbles. “I knew that. Can’t hear anything when you’re on my left.” 

“Adam, I’m… I’m sorry.” Ronan ducks his head, hiding his face with his arms. “We shouldn’t have taken her out without asking you.” 

“It’s not. I should have been more careful,” Adam gets out, his eyes blinking lazily. “M’ glad Emma’s okay.” 

“She wants to see you. She’s worried,” Ronan admits. “She was in here for like five minutes, because she refused to go to Monmouth with Gansey until she saw you, last night. But it looked… it didn’t help. Emma seeing you awake will probably make her feel better.”

“Shit,” is all Adam says. “Yeah. I should…” But Adam trails off, eyes glazing over just a little. “I messed this up so bad.”

“I’ll go… she’s right outside,” Ronan says, practically scrambling up. He doesn’t want to leave Adam alone, but he needs to get ahead of this before Adam flips his shit. Ronan has flipped his shit with a bruised rib before, and that hurt like a motherfucker. He can’t imagine what it would be like with three broken ones. 

Ronan is back almost as soon as he left, Gansey and Emma trailing behind him. Adam tries to smile as Emma approaches hesitantly, freshly showered and hair neatly plaited, but it’s the equivalent of trying to put a piece of tape over a chism in a sidewalk. 

“Hey, Emma,” Adam greets, pulling the mask down to his chin. He tries to sit up a little, ignores Gansey’s and Ronan’s noises of protest at the evidence of pain he’s trying so hard to hide. 

“Nuh uh, Parrish. Put that shit back,” Ronan argues, but Adam just ignores him. Adam opens his arms, and hesitantly, Emma crawls onto the bed, wraps her arms slowly around Adam. Adam hides the wince by moving the hand with the IV to the back of Emma’s head. She’s clinging now, and Adam can’t tell if he’s crying from the pain or the entire situation. 

“You’re okay,” Emma breathes out against him. “You were sleeping for so long.” 

“Emma Bug, you gotta let him breathe,” Ronan says as he pries her off of Adam. Adam is barely breathing, and Emma’s eyes widen as Ronan unceremoniously shoves the mask back against Adam’s face. “He’s fine, he’s just a dumbass.” Emma smiles a little, settles herself on the bed by Adam’s feet. 

“When can I get out of here?” Adam croaks, once he’s a little more in control of himself. “I gotta take care of this shit.”

“It’s taken care of. Me and Ronan got your stuff from the trailer, worked it out with your mom,” Gansey says quickly. “Your doctor said you can probably leave tomorrow, but they want your ribs to heal a bit before they feel comfortable releasing you.” 

“You talked to her?” Adam gets out. 

“Briefly. She was on the same page,” Ronan says, snorting a little. “We needed to get some stuff for Emma.” 

“Oh. Okay,” Adam says, his voice weak. He’s tired, and everything just a little too far away, and whatever drugs he’s on are smothering attempts to grab at ideas before they float out of reach. “It’s all… I can’t _think_.”

“You’re concussed,” Ronan says, voice blunt. “Take a nap, Parrish. It’ll feel better when you wake up.” Emma nods along, her hands playing with the twin plaits Ronan obviously did. 

“You look really tired,” Emma says. “Exhausted.” There’s a pause, in which Gansey raises a single eyebrow in a challenge. “E-x-h-a-u-s-t-e-d.” When Gansey nods, Emma smiles wide. 

“It’s fine. I should see if they’ll let me—”

“Nope.” Ronan reaches over Adam, to the button lying just outside of Adam’s reach. “Dunno why they bothered giving you patient-controlled pain meds.” And then he presses the button.

“Ronan, I don’t—” But everything is already blurring at the edges. Ronan lifts Emma off of the bed by the armpits, and by the time he turns back around Adam is asleep, again.

:: ::

Two days later, Adam is Ronan’s bed at Monmouth. Ronan is also in Ronan’s bed, because Adam refuses to use an actual pillow when Ronan’s chest exists. His legs are slotted between Ronan’s, and his arms are wrapped tightly around the other boy. Adam is asleep, breathing even and easy for the first time since his father broke his ribs.

Ronan just plays with Adam’s hair. 

Adam is exhausted; he was released from the hospital that morning, and the rest of his day until this point has been calling work and apartment-hunting. It’s only three, but Adam is still concussed as hell.

Emma wanders into the room, eyes widening when she sees Adam is asleep. Ronan removes the hand resting on Adam’s back, in one of the few places bandages don’t cover. He puts a finger to his lips, and Emma nods. 

“He’s taking a nap?” Emma whispers, sitting on the corner of the bed. “Gansey wants to know what you want to do for dinner tonight.”

“He’s tired, Emma,” Ronan whispers. “He needs a lot of rest, still.”

“Adam never takes naps, not even…” Emma just trails off, biting her lip. There’s a lot to unpack there, and Ronan should probably start, but it still amazes him. It amazes him how much Adam has hidden from Emma, from the hospital visits to the bone-deep exhaustion that never seems to leave Adam. 

“Let him sleep, okay?” Ronan asks, his voice deliberately soft. He can feel Adam shifting on top of him, nearing the bubble of consciousness. Emma just nods, and she manages a small smile. 

“I’m going to paint Noah’s nails,” she says, and then quietly leaves. 

Somehow, Adam is still asleep. Ronan looks down to the purpled, mottled, and cut face, to the crease that only leaves between his brows in sleep. Adam looks at peace, relaxed, and Ronan wants to capture this moment in his memory forever, the smell of Adam’s freshly washed hair, the feeling of Adam’s steady breathing against his own chest. 

Almost an hour later, Adam announces his return to consciousness with a groan. 

“Hello to you too,” Ronan says, his voice a deep grumble, his thumb rubbing Adam’s shoulder in one of the spared areas. “How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” Adam grunts, his voice still thick with sleep. “How’s Emma?”

“Painting Noah’s nails, so they’ll both be delighted,” Ronan says. Adam moves to sit up, but Ronan’s arms tighten around him. “Just relax, Parrish. Take it slow.” 

“I’m fine, Ronan. I need to get back to work,” Adam says, but Ronan won’t loosen his grip. “I’m honestly fine, now.” But Adam winces when he pulls himself off of Ronan, and Ronan sighs. 

“You’re really not. I’ve got your pain meds, but you gotta eat to take them,” he offers, rubbing the back of his own head when Adam sighs. 

“It’s not that bad,” Adam mumbles, but Ronan isn’t going to even entertain this argument.

“We’re not gonna eat dinner for a few hours yet, so you want something now? I can make scrambled eggs,” Ronan says, gently lifting Adam off of him and onto the pillow. “Come on, I’ll even add some of Gansey’s expensive cheese.” 

“You know the way to a man’s heart, Lynch,” Adam says, allows Ronan to pull him up to his feet. Adam sways a little, but swats away Ronan’s hand and lurches his way out to the newly-created kitchen of Monmouth. He sits himself up on the counter with a grunt. 

“Adam! Look at Noah’s nails!” Emma calls from the kitchen table. Sure enough, Noah holds up one hand that has no less than eight different, sparkly colors on it, and he’s grinning. 

“It looks amazing,” Adam says genuinely, and Emma _beams_. 

“He’s gonna do mine, now!” she says gleefully, and Noah chuckles. 

“Two eggs, Parrish?” Ronan asks, and Adam nods, his teeth catching on his lower lip. In other circumstances, Ronan would find that unbearable. Now, he knows it’s just a manifestation of Adam trying hard to keep his brain from eating itself alive. 

 

“What color do you want your nails?” Noah asks, and Emma’s attention is turned away. 

Ronan places his hands on Adam’s knees, tries to offer support or strength or energy or whatever it is that Adam needs right now. There’s a lot that they still need to talk about: Adam is trying to find a place to live, they need to talk about what happened with Emma, and their relationship is still just so _new_. Adam is on the edge, anxiety and exhaustion warring inside of him constantly, and then there’s the aftermath of all of this. Ronan knows what it’s like to have a fucked up headspace, but has no idea how any of this is going to affect Adam. 

But Adam Parrish smiles at him. And that’s all they need, just for right now.

**Author's Note:**

> this was wild™. also, i started writing a second chapter when they're older (Emma is ~16), but honestly i'm never going to finish it so here's the gist of what happens:  
> ~mrs parrish calls emma  
> ~emma and adam fight b/c adam does not want emma to be hurt and he spent so much energy hiding shit from emma when they were younger that emma doesn't really Get why he is so, so against it  
> ~but even in the cold war period after the initial battle, emma has an assignment to write about someone who she looks up to and with ronan's help she writes about adam  
> ~after they make up she finally shows it to adam and adam c r i e s
> 
>  
> 
> anyways pls let me know what u thought in the comments or on tumblr (thoseunheard). i'll shut up now.


End file.
